6 ms·

More than NASA's annual budget... so that people can show off their running abilities. What an incredible waste.

by 908087 7y ago

dmos62 7y ago
This comment might be snarky, but it does sum up my concerns pretty accurately. I would like to hear a veritable answer to it.
- Rebelgecko 7y ago
  NASA doesn't make $2.5 billion a year from sponsors and ads like the Olympics is planning to. They're not even allowed to. Brindenstine has talked about having corporations sponsor missions before (e.g. the Doritos® ISS Crew Resupply Mission or the Mars Candy Company Rover). However there hasn't been much movement on that front, and I doubt that NASA's sponsorships would be as profitable. Imagine if IBM sponsors a rocket that self destructs after a computer glitch— it would be awkward for them and not good marketing for Watson. The Olympics are also planning on making a billion dollars or so from ticket sales. I think NASA charges $50 or so for tickets to watch a launch at the cape. At the Olympics, some tickets may be that cheap or cheaper (e.g. the Slovenia vs South Sudan handball match, no offense to either of those countries). However tickets for more popular events like the opening ceremonies are going to exceed $1000. The Olympics also has more events within a single year than NASA. There may be a few dozen launches a year, and they're hard to sell tickets for since most launch attempts get scrubbed/rescheduled at least once and they're not always in accessible locations. Meanwhile, the Olympics will have hundreds of events and you can be reasonably confident that they will happen on the same day that's on your ticket.
  - tastygreenapple 7y ago
    I think you've just explained why the olympics has a better business model than a Government agency that's charged with atmospheric research and space exploration, however, the parent comment is about how it seems like a waste to put effort into the olympics that could be invested in expanding the frontiers of our knowledge.
- adventured 7y ago
  I believe the Olympics every four years are more important for humanity than the existence of NASA. I also think we could be doing the Olympics for cheaper than ~$20b every four years. We're not leaving this planet for a long time yet. Even if we do, it's not desirable to abandon Earth, it's vastly superior to all other practical options we have. We're going to have to continue to try to co-exist and avoid any further world wars. $4b or $5b per year for a large gathering of the sort the Olympics represents, is dirt cheap if it lends even a tiny boost to global peace between nations. Keeping in mind this isn't actually an either or situation. It's obviously not either NASA's budget, or putting on the Olympics at a $20b cost. We - humanity - can in fact afford to do both. I'd vote for reducing NASA's annual budget by 19% (~$4b per year) to pay for the Olympics, if that was the only option. That's a very easy decision. It's one of the few things that most of humanity does together. Over a billion people watch some part of the Olympics globally. It's a modest, important pillar of peaceful co-existence between nations and peoples broadly. We shoud do more things together in that spirit. Maintaining peace between the 195 nations is more important than NASA's continued operation, by several orders of magnitude. For another example, the UN is also more important than NASA (the UN has a core budget comparable to an annualized cost of the Olympics). I'm not much of a fan of the UN, and I still recognize that it serves an important purpose of promoting cooperation and discussion between nations and would be almost entirely impossible to replace today. Competitive sport is critically important to humanity and arguably always has been in some form or another. Sometimes people that don't love sport generally, entirely fail to understand what it accomplishes and how important it is. If NASA goes away (and yes, it would obviously be a huge loss), a dozen other countries will continue with various space efforts. How many things do that many nations cooperate together on in an overwhelmingly positive spirit other than the Olympics?
  - izzydata 7y ago
    I don't know that I personally believe sport competition is more important for humanity than NASA. To me sciences and space exploration could easily be 10 times as important as sport. I think the point is that there could be any number of better uses for our collective time and money than sport. Imagine what we could do as a species if we were actually committed to solving something at all costs whether that is curing cancer or stopping man made climate change.

More than NASA's annual budget... so that people can show off their running abilities. What an incredible waste.

by 908087 7y ago

More than NASA's annual budget... so that people can show off their running abilities. What an incredible waste.

This comment might be snarky, but it does sum up my concerns pretty accurately. I would like to hear a veritable answer to it.

Rebelgecko 7y ago
NASA doesn't make $2.5 billion a year from sponsors and ads like the Olympics is planning to. They're not even allowed to. Brindenstine has talked about having corporations sponsor missions before (e.g. the Doritos® ISS Crew Resupply Mission or the Mars Candy Company Rover). However there hasn't been much movement on that front, and I doubt that NASA's sponsorships would be as profitable. Imagine if IBM sponsors a rocket that self destructs after a computer glitch— it would be awkward for them and not good marketing for Watson. The Olympics are also planning on making a billion dollars or so from ticket sales. I think NASA charges $50 or so for tickets to watch a launch at the cape. At the Olympics, some tickets may be that cheap or cheaper (e.g. the Slovenia vs South Sudan handball match, no offense to either of those countries). However tickets for more popular events like the opening ceremonies are going to exceed $1000. The Olympics also has more events within a single year than NASA. There may be a few dozen launches a year, and they're hard to sell tickets for since most launch attempts get scrubbed/rescheduled at least once and they're not always in accessible locations. Meanwhile, the Olympics will have hundreds of events and you can be reasonably confident that they will happen on the same day that's on your ticket.
- tastygreenapple 7y ago
  I think you've just explained why the olympics has a better business model than a Government agency that's charged with atmospheric research and space exploration, however, the parent comment is about how it seems like a waste to put effort into the olympics that could be invested in expanding the frontiers of our knowledge.
adventured 7y ago
I believe the Olympics every four years are more important for humanity than the existence of NASA. I also think we could be doing the Olympics for cheaper than ~$20b every four years. We're not leaving this planet for a long time yet. Even if we do, it's not desirable to abandon Earth, it's vastly superior to all other practical options we have. We're going to have to continue to try to co-exist and avoid any further world wars. $4b or $5b per year for a large gathering of the sort the Olympics represents, is dirt cheap if it lends even a tiny boost to global peace between nations. Keeping in mind this isn't actually an either or situation. It's obviously not either NASA's budget, or putting on the Olympics at a $20b cost. We - humanity - can in fact afford to do both. I'd vote for reducing NASA's annual budget by 19% (~$4b per year) to pay for the Olympics, if that was the only option. That's a very easy decision. It's one of the few things that most of humanity does together. Over a billion people watch some part of the Olympics globally. It's a modest, important pillar of peaceful co-existence between nations and peoples broadly. We shoud do more things together in that spirit. Maintaining peace between the 195 nations is more important than NASA's continued operation, by several orders of magnitude. For another example, the UN is also more important than NASA (the UN has a core budget comparable to an annualized cost of the Olympics). I'm not much of a fan of the UN, and I still recognize that it serves an important purpose of promoting cooperation and discussion between nations and would be almost entirely impossible to replace today. Competitive sport is critically important to humanity and arguably always has been in some form or another. Sometimes people that don't love sport generally, entirely fail to understand what it accomplishes and how important it is. If NASA goes away (and yes, it would obviously be a huge loss), a dozen other countries will continue with various space efforts. How many things do that many nations cooperate together on in an overwhelmingly positive spirit other than the Olympics?
- izzydata 7y ago
  I don't know that I personally believe sport competition is more important for humanity than NASA. To me sciences and space exploration could easily be 10 times as important as sport. I think the point is that there could be any number of better uses for our collective time and money than sport. Imagine what we could do as a species if we were actually committed to solving something at all costs whether that is curing cancer or stopping man made climate change.